Voice of the DBA

Author: way0utwest

  • Volunteering at Work: Teaching Others

    I give a few talks on career topics, and one of these is Branding Yourself for a Dream Job. In the talk, I sometimes tell a story in the volunteering section. I wanted to summarize that here, as a way to get you to think how you can do more at work and grow your brand substantially.

    A Young Worker

    I was a newly hired worker on a network team at a power plant. We supported everything from the computer network to servers to desktops to sensor devices. There were hundreds of people, over 1000 nodes, and just 5 of us. Needless to say we were busy, we had to think on our feet, and we built a lot of protocols to help us.

    We were the help desk and fielded a lot of calls from people, handling everything from password resets to reinstalling Windows to helping people work with various applications. I created a bunch of simple utilities (exes and batch scripts) that we kept on a share to help us solve common problems quickly. That was very helpful because we had a lot of repeated work.

    There was one person, I’ll call her Sarah, that called us regularly. She was an assistant in another department dealing with supplies of some sort. She had a lot of basic questions on using WordPerfect (remember this? ) and Lotus 1-2-3, often moving information to and from places and producing reports for her boss.

    We got the same questions over and over again, at least weekly if not daily. It got to the point where my entire team was so annoyed that we’d dodge her calls. This was 1991 and we had caller ID on the internal system. When she called, we’d pick up the call and immediately hand the phone to a coworker to deal with.

    This wasn’t the only person that created stress for our team, but this was the worst one. We were annoyed, and she was annoyed with us. Our feelings showed through and we gave her the minimum level of service, as slow as we could.

    Making a Difference

    I was as annoyed as everyone, but like with my utilities, I was looking for a way to make our team work more smoothly.

    At the time Windows was new and many people were intimidated with it. We had plenty of software that actually ran in a command window, like WordPerfect, while others ran as real windows (Lotus 1-2-3).

    I decided to try and fix things. I walked over to a remote building where Sarah worked. I’ve been there before to help with something, and likely my annoyance showed as she wasn’t thrilled to have me at her desk unannounced.

    I told her that I wanted to try and help her with some of the challenges with her position. I emphasized that a lot of people were struggling with these applications and I was trying to find ways to help them. I offered to bring her lunch and work through some things. At the time we were a remote station, and there was a Subway franchise that came in each day to do lunch. I said I’d buy sandwiches for a week.

    She agreed and I took her order. That simple empathy helped disarm her anger at the computer and my group.

    I bought lunch the next day and went over to Sarah’s desk. I watched her work, saw struggles, and then worked out some things to help her, created some notes she could keep around, and helped educate her.

    It took a week or two, but at the end of the time, she could self-service a lot of her issues without calling us.

    The Outcome

    First, I reduced the workload on my group. Everyone appreciated less work, and more importantly, less annoying work.

    Second, I empowered Sarah. She was able to get more work done, more quickly and felt more capable in her position. Her boss was happier with her, and I felt great.

    Lastly, because she controlled supplies, I was able to get floppy disks and other small things easily when I called her. My boss couldn’t because she was annoyed with the way he and others had treated her.

    The Investment

    This was an investment for both of us. We both invested time, giving up our lunch hours. I think this was a week or two, but not longer.  I also invested a bit of money, perhaps $5-6 a day back then, to provide lunch. Not nothing, but not a lot.

    However, the investment payed off. I kept a note of this and reminded my boss at my review. I got a raise that year, not solely on this, but since I was competing with others for money, this was something that helped me stand out.

    This also got me a good review from Sarah’s boss, which the overall manager of the station heard. That opened up opportunities for me as a developer position in the corporate headquarters opened up and I got recommendations from all three managers.

    Look for Opportunities

    These days many of us work remotely part of the time. We may not see our coworkers, and perhaps lunch isn’t easy, but we could invest time to solve something or train someone. Either online, written, or in person. A little investment to make your job (or others’) easier can pay off for the company.

    It can also pay off for your personally if you document this and bring it up with your boss. It’s also a great story for interviews.

    This is extra work. This is unpaid work. However, many people in many fields invest in their learning and advancement. From mechanics to doctors, people give up some of their time to grow their careers. You can do this as well.

  • Talking about the New Open-Source SQLCMD on Data Exposed

    I was on the Data Exposed: MVP Edition show recently, talking about SQLCMD. I’ve written a few articles on the topics as well, and a blog post about setting up a node HTTP server, which I show in the demo.

    Check out the show below:

    Read these articles for more info:

  • A New Place: Alaska!

    I’m very lucky in that I get to travel all over the globe for work and see many places. It can be hard, and this year has been a challenge. Through the first six months of the year, I’ve taken 13 trips (not all business).

    However, this week I’m off on vacation. In a new place I’ve never been: Alaska. My wife and I booked a cruise and we’re somewhere today on our way to a state neither of us has ever visited.

    Enjoy the week, and I’ll be posting pictures if you follow me anywhere else. I might write about it there, but I’m offline the rest of the week.

    For the trivia nerds, and because I like data, this is my 46th state. Four to go. Here’s my list:

    • Alabama – driven through, never stayed. One I’m missing
    • Alaska – This week!
    • Arizona – Been here many times, Grand Canyon 3 times
    • Arkansas – Never been here. Not sure I’ve even driven through
    • California – I love Cali. Fortunate enough to have been north, mid, and south here.
    • Colorado – I live here Smile
    • Connecticut – I had a client here a long time ago, so I’ve been here quite a few times
    • Delaware – Driven through a few times, spent time at Assateague Island with my wife.
    • Florida – three trips to Fl this year.
    • Georgia – Visited
    • Hawaii – lucky enough to go twice.
    • Idaho – Been here twice, once for volleyball, once to see a horse Winking smile
    • Illinois – Went to Chicago this year, going back again. Not sure I’ve done much else
    • Indiana – Been to Indy twice
    • Iowa – Driven through, stood on the border in Omaha, but never stayed here
    • Kansas – Driven through, spent time in a few cities lightly. Stayed here for a volleyball tournament and commuted to Kansas City
    • Kentucky – Family living here. Been a few times
    • Louisiana – not sure I’d have been here except for SQL Saturday. Love Baton Rouge
    • Maine – never been
    • Maryland – Family here, been many times
    • Massachusetts – Love Boston and been to quite a few cities
    • Michigan – Traveled here a couple times and spent time in Traverse City
    • Minnesota – Only been to Minneapolis. Want to go back
    • Mississippi – Spent a few nights here driving cross country. Jackson only
    • Missouri – Lots of events in KC
    • Montana – Family trip to Glacier. Highly recommended
    • Nebraska – A few times for various things
    • Nevada – Three times in Vegas this year
    • New Hampshire – Wanted to go to Dartmouth. Didn’t get accepted, but been here a few times
    • New Jersey – Quite a few times. Used to go stay here and commute into NYC for fun.
    • New Mexico – Lots of trips, and good times at Taos.
    • New York – Usually go once a year since my daughter is in uni here.
    • North Carolina – Used to skip school to surf here
    • North Dakota – Only Fargo, but went for SQL Sat
    • Ohio – Been to Cleveland a few times. I think that’s it.
    • Oklahoma – Think I’ve only been for SQL Sat
    • Oregon – Quite a few trips here. It’s beautiful
    • Pennsylvania – Lots of trips here.
    • Rhode Island – One trip to Providence in college
    • South Carolina – A few trips
    • South Dakota – Love to go camping here
    • Tennessee – A few SQL Sats and other events here
    • Texas – Been four times this year, more scheduled
    • Utah – Only one trip here, SQL Sat SLC
    • Vermont – Been here playing ultimate frisbee
    • Virginia – born here
    • Washington – Summit many times
    • West Virginia – Stayed here a couple times, but mostly driven through
    • Wisconsin – Visited family here and SQL Sat Madison
    • Wyoming – Lots of trips across the CO boarder

  • Planning for a Bad Day

    Are you ready to get a new job? I’m not talking about you deciding you want a new job and working towards that goal, but rather getting surprised by a layoff or termination today. If your boss called you into his/her office in the next 10 minutes and told you that you were being terminated today, are you ready for that? Kendra Little wrote a nice post recently asking who might be prepared.

    Most of us aren’t. In fact, in my branding presentation, one of my slides has a screenshot of a post from LinkedIn. A friend noted that they walked into work and found out his company had been purchased. It wasn’t a good day because they were also notified they were being laid off, hence the post on LinkedIn letting others know of their need to find one.

    The modern work world, especially for technology workers, isn’t stable and certain. While we have lots of positives in our jobs (work environment, low physical needs, remote possibilities, etc.), many of those can be detractions. Outsourcing IT jobs is something many companies do, and whether it’s a good idea for the company or not, it’s a reality. We also have lots of acquisitions in different spaces, and when sets of IT groups come together, there isn’t always the need to keep everyone employed. Even with double the workload, many in management would rather save money and give more responsibility to fewer people.

    Side note, this is one reason a good knowledge of DevOps, ITOps, GitOps, etc. is valuable for your career. When a manager is trying to decide who to keep, those with these skills may stand out.

    Unless you are ready to retire and merely padding your assets, you ought to have a plan for changing jobs. Even if you like your job, circumstances might force that upon you and when lots of people are scrambling for new jobs, competition can be fierce. Like Kendra, I don’t know you need a detailed plan, but documenting some skills growth and keeping your resume or CV up to date is always a good idea. I recommend everyone touch their resume every quarter. At least spend 5 minutes looking over it and thinking about it.

    Kendra has other suggestions, and I like them. In fact, I’m looking to think about a few of these. Not that I want another job, but you never know what might happen, and I’m not that close to retirement. Close, but not close enough. Certainly thinking through a few options at a high level is something I want to do with my wife.

    And make sure my resume is up to date.

    Steve Jones

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